Private Arthur John Peckett, Royal Leicestershire Regiment, born 11 December 1889 in March, Cambridgeshire, died 1916 in France.In common with thousands of other British soldiers of the Great War, the date of death and last resting place of my grandfather are unknown.

I treasure my dad's wartime journal, written between 1943 and 1945 in various RAF camps throughout France, Italy and Egypt. He used a small loose-leaf notebook, presumably the Forties equivalent of a slim Filofax and posted it home in chunks to my mum in Yorkshire.